PROGRESSO TÉCNICO NA TEORIA ECONÔMICA NAS PERSPECTIVAS DE SMITH, RICARDO, MARX, MARSHALL, SCHUMPETER E KEYNES

Abstract

Technical progress is a largely discussed matter within economics, being an essential aspect of production and serving as an indicator of important historical switches. Despite that, the way said phenomenon is understood varies significantly across different schools of thought and theorists. The present work addresses the following problem: is there a substantial difference between the ways in which Adam Smith, David Ricardo, Karl Marx, Alfred Marshall, Joseph Schumpeter, and John Keynes understand technical progress? The hypothesis proposed is that there is a disagreement regarding the nature of technical progress among these thinkers. The general objective established is to analyze the phenomenon of technical progress through these economic views, highlighting their differences and similarities. Methodologically, the research is configured as a bibliographic study, presenting a qualitative nature and a descriptive character. The comparative analysis reveals that, whereas classical authors such as Smith view progress as a natural consequence of the division of labor and Ricardo interprets it as a temporary palliative against the diminishing returns of land, Marx breaks with this tradition by situating technology as an apparatus of capital concentration and worker expropriation. In the more modern perspectives, Marshall perceives technical progress as a slow and gradual process associated with education and industrial districts; Schumpeter defines it through disruptive waves of innovation and creative destruction led by the entrepreneur; and Keynes subordinates it to fluctuations in effective demand, pointing out that, although it generates technological unemployment in the short run, accumulated progress has the potential to eliminate material scarcity in the long run. It is concluded that the initial hypothesis is confirmed, demonstrating an explicit theoretical dissent and showing that technical progress is not a neutral phenomenon, but rather a complex historical process understood through multiple divergent perspectives.